<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=iso-8859-1"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div>FYI!</div><div><br class=""><div class=""><div class="WordSection1" style="page: WordSection1; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><a href="https://networks.h-net.org/node/28765/discussions/57466/safeguarding-fulfulde-ajami-manuscripts-nigerian-jihad-poetry-usman" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Read more or reply</span></a><span lang="EN-US" class=""><o:p class=""></o:p></span></div><h2 style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 18pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-weight: bold;" class=""><a href="https://networks.h-net.org/node/28765/discussions/57434/deadline-approaching-120-africanizing-technology-wesleyan" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Deadline Approaching (1/20): Africanizing Technology, Wesleyan University, March 5-6, 2015</span></a><span lang="EN-US" class=""><o:p class=""></o:p></span></h2><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">by<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="https://networks.h-net.org/users/laura-ann-twagira" title="View user profile." style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Laura Ann Twagira</span></a><span lang="EN-US" class=""><o:p class=""></o:p></span></div><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><strong class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Africanizing Technology</span></strong><span lang="EN-US" class=""><o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Wesleyan University, March 5-6, 2015<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Keynote: Julie Livingston (Rutgers University) author of<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><em class="">Improvising Medicine: An African Oncology Ward in an Emerging Cancer Epidemic</em><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>(2012)<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Africa has long been a space of technological innovation and adaptation despite popular Western media depictions to the contrary. In fact, Africa is at the center of global technology stories such as the history of nuclear proliferation (Hecht, 2012). Recently scholars have documented novel uses of contemporary media technologies on the continent, as well as older adaptations of hi-fi stereo systems, all of which have had rich and complicated social impacts (Larkin, 2008; Jaji, 2014). Artisans and industrial workers have also created new technological cultures, while many African medical professionals have responded to technologically 'poor' environments by improvising basic solutions (Livingston, 2012). Africanizing Technology aims to highlight and interrogate these and other technology stories on the continent from an interdisciplinary perspective.<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">The inspiration for the conference theme comes from the concept of<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><em class="">Africanizing Anthropology<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></em>elaborated by Lyn Schumaker (2001). Schumaker asserted that colonial knowledge production about Africa was rooted in the collaborative research process of European Anthropologists and African research assistants; the European discipline of anthropology was transformed as a result of this shared practice. Moreover, this intellectual move placed<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><em class="">Africans<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></em>at the center of knowledge production about Africa.<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Africanizing Technology will play on this idea by looking at the ways in which technology in Africa has been Africanized. The production and use of technology is similarly rooted in knowledge production. Moreover, technology has been central to histories of development in the 20<sup class="">th</sup><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>century. Similar to scholars of development, recent researchers working on technology in Africa have argued for a shift from a previously dominant Euro-centric frame of analysis to one starting with the experiences of Africans. <o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Several crucial questions will be addressed: How is technology rooted in a longer history of African experiences? How do the emerging technological cultures on the continent contribute to our broader understandings of health, education, and social change? How does Africanizing Technology reshape our scholarly understandings of development? Can we speak of a broader pattern of Africanizing Technology in the current global circulation of digital media and other technologies?<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">We welcome papers that address the following themes in particular:<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class="">Medical Technologies and Improvisation<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Digital Humanities and Communication<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Gender, Technology and Social Innovation<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Development and Technologies of Mobility<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Please submit a 300-word abstract and C.V. to Laura Ann Twagira, Assistant Professor of History (</span><a href="mailto:ltwagira@wesleyan.edu" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">ltwagira@wesleyan.edu</span></a><span lang="EN-US" class="">) no later than January 20, 2015. Limited funding is available to help defray travel and accommodation expenses for invited presenters.<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p style="margin-right: 0cm; margin-left: 0cm; font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">Co-sponsored by the African Studies Cluster, the History Department, and the Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship at Wesleyan University.<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;"><a href="https://networks.h-net.org/node/28765/discussions/57434/deadline-approaching-120-africanizing-technology-wesleyan" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class="">Read more or reply</a></span></div></div></div></div></body></html>